Oxford Union WUDC 1993

The Oxford Union

Oxford Union Society's convenor was Matthew Christmas (an apt name considering the time of year). The Chief Adjudicator was Michael Gove. The organising committee spanned two pages of its booklet, a sign of the ever increasing complexity of running Worlds.

The prizes were designed to remind the winners of Oxford and so rowing oars (from the famous "Boat Race") were chosen. How exactly these were brought home by the eventual winners, Harvard (David Friedman and David Kennedy), is not remembered. Daniel Mulino (ANU) was best speaker.

Former British Prime Minister Edward Heath addressed the championship dinner. Worlds Council had to select a new host for the 1994 championships after Sydney, who had been awarded the championships in Trinity, had to pull out. They came with another college prepared to host (Melbourne). Princeton also offered a bid to Worlds Council but Melbourne were more prepared, probably because they knew earlier of Sydney's misfortune. Princeton were encouraged to bid for the 1995 championships instead.

This History of the World Debating Championships comes in 3 parts. From 1976 to 1990 it is taken almost word for word from the 1991 Toronto WUDC Tournament booklet. Who wrote it isn't known but it was provided by Randal Horobik. At the start of the section on Worlds in 1981 is an extract from an e-mail by Clark McGinn, Convenor of Debates, GU Union 1980 -81 and 1981 and Convenor of the First World Debating Competition, 1981. The history since 1991 has been compiled initially by Colm Flynn and edited by many contributors to Wikipedia. Unfortunately Wikipedia deleted the history due to copyright concerns so we are back here. Hopefully anyone who contributed to the Wiki article before it was deleted will be happy to see their work preserved here.